Passage 1It was mid-afternoon on oursecond day living in Hawaii, and I woke up feeling slightly ill from amuch-needed power nap. I stumbled into the kitchen where my girlfriend was sittingon the floor with the guy from the cable company. He had come to set up ourinternet-something we urgently needed, because our house is situated in a lushvalley with no mobile phone signal. But, I realized they weren't even talkingabout the Intemnet. Instead, I found, he was inviting her to come hunting withhim.As the days passed, thefriendly happenings increased. We stopped by a neighborhood farm and wereoffered avocados(鳄梨) from the caretakers' tree. We arrived at the end of a hikingtrail, or so we thought, when a passing father and daughter offered to show usthe secret additional part of the path that led to a hidden watell. Onanother occasion, we were headed for a swim in the ocean, when someone on shorewamed us that the current was too strong to swim safely, then offered us a beerand invited us to go canoeing.There may be many words toexplain these kinds of encounters, but at least one of themis"Aloha."And as it turns out, "Aloha"is actually the lawhere.Hawaii now hosts almost ninemillion visitors a year, and "Aloha"is a word that most of thosetourists will hear during their time on the islands. The word is used in placeof hello and goodbye, but it means much more than that. It's also a shorthandfor the spirit of the islands--the people and the land-and what makes thisplace so unique."Alo means ‘face to face' and Hameans ‘breath of life'," according to DaviannaPomaika'i McGregor, a Hawaii historian and founding member of the Department ofEthnic Studies at the University of Hawaii, Manoa But McGregor also noted thatthere are several less literal, but equally valid, interpretations of the word.One particularinterpretation was shared by a respected Maui elder named Pilahi Paki at the1970 conference, Hawaii 2000, where people had gathered to discuss the past,present and future of Hawaii. It was a time of heightened disagreement in theislands over some political issues, and Paki stood up to give an emotionalspeech about the Aloha Spirit-in other words, the unique spiritual and culturalcode of Hawaii that is uniting rather than dividing. In it,she described whatAloha meant about the way people should treat one another.In her speech, she brokeeach letter of "Aloha"down to one phrase. And that speech became thebasis for Hawaii's Aloha Spirit law, which essentially mandates considerationand kindness.Although the Aloha Spiritlaw didn't become official until 1986, its origins are deeply rooted in nativeHawaiian culture. Aloha is concept that grew out of the necessity for Hawaiiansto live in peace and work together in harmony with the land and theirspiritualbeliefs, McGregor told me.According to the HawaiiState Attorney's Office, the law is mostly symbolic, but that doesn't mean itdoesn't work-especially when political leaders or business people get out ofline. What do we know about the Aloha Spirit?